Category Archives: Geeky Wednesdays

A Geek Love Song

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A better version of this song sans video can be heard here.

Well, St. Valentine’s Day is nearly upon us. ‘Tis the season for glitter-encrusted cards, nagging advertisements, candy hearts that taste like quinine, romantic comedies and grocery store aisles decked out in pink, red and white. It is a time for single people to feel self-conscious, and for people in relationships to feel stressed.

These are the times that try men’s souls. It is on such dark, hopeless occasions as St. Valentine’s Day—yes I am being sarcastic—we need the encouragement and strength of a love song for geeks. Debs and Errol, geeky musicians extraordinaire, are here to help!

In the video above, Errol sings of how to say I love you in various geeky languages. Anyone can say it in English, but how about Sindarin, Pig Latin, Huttese, lolcat (which I consider a legitimate dialect) or binary?

Geeky humor aside, in this season of candy hearts and commercial hype, I think we sometimes forget to let our loved ones know we love them. It’s no bad thing to be reminded to say “I love you” occasionally… though I suggest saying it in English!

Tolkien on Fantasy

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It was a beautiful golden harp, and when Thorin struck it the music began all at once, so sudden and sweet that Bilbo forgot everything else, and was swept away into dark lands under strange moons, far over The Water and very far from his hobbit-hole under The Hill.

J.R.R. Tolkien

There are a few works, just a few, which have given me glimpses of Fantasy.

Sure, I’ve read and seen and played plenty of fantasies. Few have shown me Fantasy. You see, Fantasy is a realm beyond our own: a mysterious, beautiful, dangerous place we are seldom privileged to see. Tolkien called it Faerie.

The realm of fairy-story is wide and deep and high and filled with many things: all manner of beasts and birds are found there; shoreless seas and stars uncounted; beauty that is an enchantment, and an ever-present peril; both joy and sorrow as sharp as swords. In that realm a man may, perhaps, count himself fortunate to have wandered, but its very richness and strangeness tie the tongue of a traveller who would report them. And while he is there it is dangerous for him to ask too many questions, lest the gates should be shut and the keys be lost.

There are worlds we know, the worlds of Tolkien and C.S. Lewis and The Legend of Zelda and Final Fantasy: Middle Earth, Narnia, Hyrule, Spira, Ivalice and others. None of these are Fantasy, yet all of them have given me glimpses of it. Like Thorin’s golden harp, they carried me to faraway places full of danger and beauty and mystery: snowy peaks and tangled forests and mines whose gems shine like stars in the dark heavens.

I enjoy escaping to Fantasy. My brief trips there are never planned, sadly. They just happen, and I think they’re a good thing. Consider these words from Tolkien:

I do not accept the tone of scorn or pity with which ‘Escape’ is now so often used. Why should a man be scorned if, finding himself in prison, he tries to get out and go home? Or if he cannot do so, he thinks and talks about other topics than jailers and prison-walls?

In my ordinary life, I appreciate my fleeting visits to Fantasy. It’s nice to get away!

A Portrait of the Artist as a Hero Drinking Coffee

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Link Drinking CoffeeLook at that picture. Look at it. I wish I could draw pictures like that.

While I fool around on this blog, my younger brother sketches fantastic pictures in pencil and posts them on his deviantART page. Seriously, I don’t know how he produces drawings like these. I’m guessing pencils and paper are involved somehow; the rest is a glorious mystery.

The image above is my brother’s profile picture: Link, the protagonist of the Legend of Zelda games, drinking coffee and drawing… himself. (If his coffee cup is to be believed, Link is also the World’s Best Hero.) As a Zelda fan, I find my bro’s profile picture clever and hilarious.

I strongly recommend taking a look around my brother’s deviantART profile. Seriously, it’s cool. Check it out!

Fifty Years of Doctor Who

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Doctor Who, the British sci-fi television program, has been around for fifty years. That’s a long time for a television show to exist. Heck, that’s a long time for anything to exist.

The long-awaited Doctor Who fiftieth anniversary special airs this Saturday. (Awesomely, the premier for the newest season of My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic, for which I am unashamedly excited, airs on the same day.) The Doctor Who special promises homicidal aliens, majestic sideburns and answers to longstanding questions about the good Doctor.

Doctor Who is a wonderful show. The acting and writing are superb, and the premise is (as the Doctor himself would put it) absolutely fantastic. Simply put, Doctor Who is the tale of an eccentric, cheerful, cheeky traveler and the blue box in which he roams the whole of time and space. Storytelling opportunities are endless. After fifty years, Doctor Who continues to amaze.

In celebration of fifty years of quirky British science fiction, here’s an epic song about the not-quite inexorable passage of time. Enjoy!

The Slenderman

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Thank you, alex663 from deviantART, for making sure I never sleep again.

For as long as there have been people, there have been spooky stories. Our distant ancestors handed down frightful tales of witches, werewolves, goblins, vampires (the non-sparkly variety) and the undead. What of our time? What creepy creatures will we bequeath to generations not yet born?

Meet the Slenderman.

This photo actually looks pretty norm—HEAVEN HELP US WHAT IS THAT?!

The Slenderman (or Slender Man) first appeared on some Internet forum, eventually becoming the silent, sinister villain of a simple-yet-terrifying indie video game called Slender: The Eight Pages. Slendy’s fame spread. I even mentioned him in what I consider probably the best post on this blog.

The Slenderman is an unnaturally tall, thin man with a black suit and no face. He has shown up in many media, including an ongoing YouTube series called Marble Hornets, in which he has developed a few consistent characteristics.

Besides having some fashion sense, the Slenderman stalks people, drives them insane and occasionally murders them. Cameras and recording equipment glitch whenever the Slenderman is near. His victims experience an ailment dubbed “Slender sickness,” whose symptoms are amnesia, paranoia, aggression and a tendency to wear creepy masks.

Why is Slendy so scary? I think it has something to do with his blank face, spectral appearance and unnatural proportions. He looks almost, but not quite, human. There’s also something creepy in how he silently toys with his victims instead of killing them outright. Is he a man? A spirit? A hallucination?

One thing he is, and that’s creepy.

That said, here are some tips from a player of Slender: The Eight Pages on how to make Slendy not scary.

When Poetry Is Awesome

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Day after day, day after day, we stuck, nor breath nor motion; as idle as a painted ship upon a painted ocean.

Water, water, every where, and all the boards did shrink; water, water, every where, nor any drop to drink.

“The Rime of the Ancient Mariner,” Samuel Taylor Coleridge

I almost never read poetry. For the record, I have nothing against it. Poetry is a wonderful form of literary expression—heck, I’ve even written a few poems—but it’s not my cup of tea. I’ll take novels or short stories over poems any day.

Nevertheless, I occasionally stumble upon some poetic jewel: a phrase, verse or stanza of dazzling magnificence. The two stanzas above from “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner” amaze me. In just a few well-chosen words, the poet conveys the quiet desperation of sailors lost at sea.

Then there’s this stanza from “The Charge of the Light Brigade” by Alfred, Lord Tennyson, which I find incredibly epic even out of context:

Theirs not to make reply, theirs not to reason why, theirs but to do and die: into the valley of Death rode the six hundred.

My other favorites include the poem “Invictus” and the first eight verses of Ecclesiastes 12. So… much… awesome.

What’s your favorite poem or snippet of poetry? Let us know in the comments!

Phoenix Wright Is Back

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Dash it, Phoenix. I missed you. Welcome back.

It’s been more than five years since Phoenix Wright, the sarcastic and spiky-haired star of the (surprisingly fun) Ace Attorney games, has defended the innocent in court. Tomorrow marks his triumphant return to the courtroom as a defense attorney in the latest Ace Attorney game. I expect it to be full of clever crimes, plot twists, great music, sarcastic quips and melodramatic objections.

In celebration of this long-awaited occasion, here’s a brief recap of Wright’s early years.

Biblical Poetry Is Weird

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How beautiful you are, my darling! Oh, how beautiful! Your eyes behind your veil are doves. Your hair is like a flock of goats descending from the hills of Gilead. Your teeth are like a flock of sheep just shorn, coming up from the washing. Each has its twin; not one of them is alone.

Song of Songs 4:1-2

Protip: If you’re dating a woman, don’t compare her physical features to farm animals.

The Bible is full of weird poetry. Take Song of Songs, also called Song of Solomon. Its original audience may have found it moving or beautiful, but the past three millennia have not been kind to its similes. What must have been romantic in Solomon’s day seems very strange to us.

Reading Song of Songs is an amusing and educational experience. In praising a woman’s beauty, for example, the book compares her nose to a tower and her breasts to young gazelles. Sweet, sexy or just weird? I prefer not to think about it.

Song of Songs describes the woman’s lover in slightly less bizarre terms. Parts of the man’s body are likened to doves, gold, jewels, flowers and spices. These may not be the most masculine comparisons, but at least the man doesn’t sparkle in the sunlight like a certain vampire.

Biblical or otherwise, what’s your favorite strange bit of poetry? Let us know in the comments!